Meet the Parent (Again)
by Adreus
Summary: Time passes, and families heal. If certain nineteen-year-olds will let them. Haruto takes matters into his own hands: "Niisan, when will you bring your boyfriends over for dinner?" —Yuma/Kaito/Ryoga, Haruto, and Dr. Faker.


**Notes: **For the ficathon prompt, "Stolenshipping, meeting the family for the first time." More or less. It's a cringe comedy.

* * *

_Meet the Parent (Again)_

* * *

The entire ordeal starts when they're having breakfast one morning, together for once because through some miracle Kaito decided to actually _have_ breakfast, sat down next to Haruto with a bowl of cereal and a glass of milk and a yawn — right before Faker unexpectedly joined them.

A tension is set about the air; Haruto attempts to breach it with a cheerful, "Good morning! Are you having breakfast today, too, Tousan?" to which Faker sort of half-nods, because he's too busy looking at Kaito with a curious expression to really say anything other than "Morning."

Kaito has an intense staring contest with his glass of milk before a tiny foot kicks his leg under the table, and he begrudgingly adds his own, "...good morning," and shoots a smile that lurks at the corner of his mouth in Haruto's direction when his little brother grins at his handiwork. It quickly melts away when Faker says, again, "Ah, good morning, Kaito."

Their lackluster greetings land on the ice but don't have enough force to break it; for the remainder of their meal conversation remains quite obviously absent, with both Faker and Kaito (for Haruto's benefit) making brief attempts at it and managing only two or three replies before shoveling more food into their mouths and falling silent once again, no thanks due to Kaito's curtness. Only when the conversation belongs exclusively to himself and to Haruto does Kaito even bother sitting up properly; whether Haruto says something like "pass the salt" or "can we get a cat?", Kaito turns to him and fixes him with the same amount of attention, where Faker continues to receive quarter-hearted attempts to actually care.

Haruto is... well aware of Kaito's priorities, and devious enough to capitalize on them when Kaito finishes his breakfast and gets up to wash his bowl and glass.

"Niisan," he says, loudly, clearly, "when am I going to meet your other boyfriend?"

There's the beat of silence — the water running purposelessly; Faker perking up at the scrap of information offered to him so freely; Kaito wincing at Haruto's lack of tact, because not only is that an opening for Faker to wonder at personal details of Kaito's life that he'd rather not share, it's also an offering that has... _implications_...

Maybe if Kaito squeezes the sink shut and closes his eyes and squares his shoulders and breathes, his father won't ask.

"..._Other_ boyfriend?"

Or.

Kaito decides the best course of action is to pretend he didn't hear either of them. It's not the most tactical of plans, but he'll just have to be especially stubborn about it, which is nothing new when it comes to his father, so really, it's not problem at all; he'd steel his heart to sad, wrinkly old men, but it's already there.

"Heeey, Niisan," Haruto prods then, and if it were anyone else Kaito would slap them.

"What is it," he asks evenly, and now that Haruto's done eating Kaito takes his dishes to wash, and Faker's, too, just so that his excuse to not look at them lasts longer.

"Shark!" exclaims Haruto, clasping his hands together, and god _dammit_, "When can he come over?"

Kaito's about to say something like "my boyfriends aren't your playmates, Haruto", except that they totally are, aren't they, and anyway this is part of Haruto's plan to dig as deep a hole as he can for Niisan, push him into it, and then give their father its exact location, all while hiding under that cute, innocent smile, isn't it?

"Shark?" tries Faker this time, and he's not a _total_ idiot, he's got a doctorate and all that, hasn't he, that's gotta mean something, so the cogs in his head are going to turn and they're going to figure out sooner than later that the only Shark Kaito (unfortunately) associates with is Kamishiro Ryoga, going to figure out what Haruto's not-so-subtly implying—

"Kaito," speaks Faker now, and thanks for the direct address, Tousan, "You're involved with Shark?"

And Kaito would laugh at Faker's choice of words, but he doesn't because Kaito makes it a general point not to ever laugh—especially not in front of his father. Instead he sort of grunts his affirmation, hears Haruto's tiny chuckle, something muffled poorly into palm.

"I didn't know that," says Faker, and of course he didn't, nobody told him, and why would they? All three of present company know this, know that it would never have come up if Haruto weren't guiding the whole conversation, and they also know that Faker's just trying to keep it going now, latching onto it and probably looking for an opening to ask Kaito about the others—

"Hey, Niisan, what about Yuma?"

—_Haruto_.

"What," starts Kaito, deadpan, "about Yuma."

"Aren't you involved with Yuma, too?"

How sweet is the sound of his little brother's voice.

"Am I," Kaito mutters to himself, and he finishes the dishes, sighs, and turns to face them, crossing his arms and leaning against the counter, the washcloth still in his hand. Haruto beams at him. Kaito gives him the same smile from earlier, an eyebrow raised in a tacit, _you're only getting away with this because you're you, you know_, and Haruto's giggle translates simply enough: He knows.

"Yes," Kaito says. "I am."

Faker looks to Haruto, surprised that Kaito's actually answered him. Haruto nods encouragingly, his legs swinging back and forth underneath the table. In his head, Kaito tries to piece together an escape route.

"Yuma and Shark," says Faker. "Then, you..."

"It's the three of us." He closes his eyes again. Easier that way.

"Oh." And then, a second, "oh." A beat, and then: "...Well, that made a pretty good tag duel team."

"...Yeah."

A silence as graceful as three trainwrecks, and Kaito can see his escape; he stands properly, ready to walk out.

"Niisan," Haruto pipes up again, and Kaito tightens his grip on the washcloth, "when're you bringing them over?"

Kaito and Faker look equally surprised at that idea, except that Kaito's surprise is a tired, ino/i kind of surprised, and Faker's eyes light up to their highest capacity.

"Bringing them over?" asks Kaito.

"For dinner!"

"For... dinner?"

"That's when you do this thing called eating, Niisan," Haruto explains, smiling pleasently. "I'm sure Yuma and Shark already know what it is."

"You're being awfully cheeky today," says Kaito, and the tiny smile appears for a third time, but he furrows his brow, because, yes, actually, he does know what dinner is, but is Haruto actually implying that they're going to have it together as a family or whatever, and moreover that Kaito should bring two middle schoolers, one overzealous and the other just a blockhead, over to join such an inauspicious occasion, because, aha, _how do we screw that up, let me count the ways_—

"I think it sounds like a lovely idea," contributes Dr. Faker, folding his hands together on the table with a weary smile of his own. "It's the least I can do."

"The least you can do is nothing," replies Kaito, because maybe he hasn't noticed, or maybe he's forgotten in the wake of their family healing or whatever this is supposed to be, but everything Faker touches seems to break, Kaito and Haruto and everything before and in-between and after, and Kaito's not sure if he has strong enough faith in his relationship with Yuma and Ryoga for it to last through dinner with his family—buuut now Haruto's giving him a look, one of the looks that belongs to the ultimate patriarch of the family, and so Kaito sighs, shrugs, and walks out of the kitchen.

"I'll call them."

* * *

Haruto and Dr. Faker dress up. Kaito dresses down. Yuma and Ryoga show up in their usual casual wear sans jackets, Ryoga not seeing the point in impressing Kaito's "crazy-ass ex-evil Barian-trusting old man", Yuma apparently not actually owning anything else.

They arrive together, and Orbital tells them to wait and calls down Kaito, who comes down in a henley and a burberry; Ryoga takes in his appearance and snorts. Kaito rolls his eyes.

"Evening to you, too," says Kaito.

"I see you care about this even less than I do."

"You guys," Yuma cuts in, "Be nice! Kaito's dad's just trying to make a bond with us, don't you think so?"

Kaito doesn't really care for his dad's bond with his boyfriends, and Ryoga grunts, but Yuma glares at them and it's the cutest, most ambitious glare in the world since it's from Yuma, so Kaito sighs and Ryoga asks, "And how the hell do we make the part where we kicked his ass to save the world not awkward?"

Yuma makes a face at Ryoga in response, and Ryoga arches his eyebrows like, _I'm just saying_, and Kaito tells them to maybe just not mention it and makes them follow him into the elevator and then into the dining room, which is more or less the same as all their other rooms, except it has a table and chairs and dishes and food, and Haruto and Faker are already sitting at its opposite end. Yuma greets them overenthusiastically, which is probably okay, considering it compensates nicely for the stick up Ryoga's ass when he just raises his hand and offers a profound, "Yo."

That's when Faker says his greetings, which start out as something like "welcome, it fills this old man's heart with happiness to find that after all his mistakes his son has such good friends" but then goes on too long when Faker continues and it's sort of rehearsed and it's sort of poetic, but Faker is a terrible orator so it comes out very awkward, and Ryoga kind of gets bored and they're still standing when he finishes and Yuma delivers an "I-It's okay, really! You don't have to make it up to us, as long as you work together with Kaito and Haruto!", and Ryoga says, "Yeah, whatever."

Then it's Haruto's turn and he clears his throat and says a simple, "Hi, Yuma, Shark!" and he gestures for them to sit next to each other, and they do, Yuma opposite Haruto, Ryoga next to Yuma, and Kaito next to Haruto, with Faker at the head of the table.

There's silence.

Ryoga pulls out his Gazer and starts playing around with it like he's texting, which Kaito knows isn't actually happening unless it's to Rio, because the only people Ryoga actually texts are his boyfriends.

Yuma's grin is so wide it threatens to break his face.

Faker keeps staring at Ryoga, at Yuma, at Kaito, and then back again, his brow knitting together with each cycle.

Haruto tugs at Kaito's shirt.

"What is it?" says Kaito, who'd taken out his D-Pad the second he sat down and has been aimlessly scrolling through his RSS reader. Haruto gestures around the table and looks at Kaito like, _um, do something_, and Kaito looks back like, _well, what did you expect?_

"Niisan," prompts Haruto.

Kaito sighs. "Tousan," he says, and everyone's attention immediately snaps to him.

"Ah — yes, Kaito?"

"These are the guys I'm involved with," Kaito says boredly. "Kamishiro Ryoga"—he points at Ryoga, who's confused, like, _yes, we've met, you murdered Yuma's father and tried to murder him, too_—"and Tsukumo Yuma."

"Um," says Yuma, offering Faker his hand, "pleased to meet you."

…

More silence.

Yuma clears his throat. Ryoga returns to his Gazer. Faker folds his hands and smiles and stares at his plate. Kaito finds out that there was a plane crash in Italy, and continues scrolling.

Haruto beams.


End file.
